Works well when used for the tasks it is designed for.

  • Easy and intuitive UI for doing simple low volume tasks (File copy, Library copy , Teams team copy etc. Excellent guidance and interactivity
  • SharePoint governance reporting and management features. Users, sites and site collations, files etc. Very useful for gaining insights into what is stored in SharePoint.
  • Copy a Microsoft Teams team from a to b and do Teams governance
  • Copy a site or site collection from a to b
  • Copy a SharePoint List or Library from a to b. If the destination already exist it also works great with simple column mapping
  • File copy based on a small predefined CSV or Excel file in the right Sharegate format with all mappings, metadata and URLs etc. defined
  • Works good with low volume and low complexity when reporting and error tracking is less important so that manual labour can handle it.

Sharegate is not an enterprise level tool and does not have or do.

  • Actionable consolidated reporting
Consolidated always up-to-date and actionable reporting.
You have a consistent and consolidated overview of where the migration project stands.
The reporting output can be used directly for ReMigration or
RetryMigration. Effectively eliminating all CSV and Excel sheets. Notice that you can secretively ReMigrate files to fix metadata issues etc. even thought initially migrated successfully.
The consolidated always up-to-date actionable reporting includes:
  • What files are migrated
  • What are the metadata issues
  • What files failed
You have to develop your own bespoke migration automation tool yourself for each project in PowerShell and then use Sharegate as a callable function (CMDLET) in your code. In other word a complete application that a part from the Sharegate CMDLET functionality must include:
  • Consolidated logging and reporting
  • ReMigration and RetryMigration on specific files
  • Actionable consolidated status/overview ,across all job sessions, for which files are migrated and which are not or have issues.
  • Error handling and notification.
  • Migration control logic.
  • Data calculations and transformations
  • Data validations and resolving of SharePoint Complex data types (Users, Content-Type, Lookup, ManagedMetadata)
  • Performance optimizations for high volume > (25k files)
  • Testing and interactive analysis of control data and content.
  • Dynamic mapping of Content-Types, ManagedMetadata, Lookups, Choice etc.
  • Cherry picking
Migration where one or more data sources drive the migration rather than the source storage location – In other words: a list of files, optionally also versions, with or without metadata
  • Consolidated error tracking
Reporting is a manual task where you must “dive into” hundreds or thousands of text or raw Excel files. In other words you must create your own reporting solution.
  • Dynamic environment
Everything is hardcoded and tied to a single configuration. In many cases a migration task or data integration task consists of multiple steps that interact and take parameters. In Sharegate you have to start coding complex PowerShell to do any of that thereby totally compromising the simplicity of the Sharegate UI experience
  • Automation
All tasks are hand crafted and 100% hand held. Any automation must be custom programmed in PowerShell with no exception, compromising the simplicity of the Sharegate UI experience
  • Calculation/dynamic behaviour
Nothing can be dynamic, parameterized or calculated in any way.
  • SharePoint Query
No support for querying anything but file extension and modified date in a SharePoint Library
  • Data access and data manipulation
No functionality what so ever. The lack of any functionality is consistent with the fact that the environment is 100% static, has no automation, calculations or dynamic capabilities at all.
  • Migrate custom CMS
Combine files from FileShares with metadata from SQLServer and create document library items with version history
  • Data driven Migration
Use a data source (SQL, CSV, Excel, SP List) to dynamically control file source and destination + metadata
  • Restructuring
Break up large Libraries and FileShares and distribute the files across many SharePoint destinations with dynamic metadata
  • Visual preview
No actions are visually previewed. You have to try and se what happens by “diving into” the text based logs sheets raw sheets it in Excel.
  • UI for advanced use cases
Then Sharegate environment is 100% static, manual and hardcoded and offers no way to do composite or parameterized jobs in any form. To accomplish any kind of dynamic or automated behaviour you must code your own solution in PowerShell, totally compromising the simplicity of the Sharegate UI experience
  • Job notification
There is no way to do any form of notification for job progress tracking. or job results
  • High volume handling
The reporting and the way it works internally is simply not suited for high volume processing (>1 million files) or distributing content to many locations/sites (>500 locations/sites)
  • No Job Server
Any task can only run while logged into the UI of Sharegate. In other words there is no way to have jobs running unless logged in to the machine having Sharegate installed and having the Sharegate running.

Explanation to the above quote: While the other car makers were having highly specialized people for each task, all working on a single car at a time (essentially custom building each one, analogously to using PowerShell scripts over and over again), Ford were using tested and automated assembly line. He did not invent the wheel every time. He just used the methods that were already tested and proven and did not have to employ an army of specialists. See? So using PowerShell and Sharegate as Cmdlet (analogue to a screwdriver) is by far inefficient and error prone. And more over this constellation totally compromises the simple Sharegate UI experience.

Last modified: 18 October 2022

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